Bring On Tomorrow
by angel-death-dealer
Summary: Gibbs and Jenny run the Summerville Children's Home, where some of the more permanent residents go about setting their boundaries in life as they struggle through the hardest and best years of their lives. Rated for references. All ships!
1. Chapter 1

**Basically, everyone seems to be trying a story where the team are kids, and I really like this idea! I'd love to see how they all interacted that age, and I keep wondering how the moments in the show might be different. I wanted to try it myself, but didn't want to go with the typical, so I've tried to do something a bit different. All of the team are part of a children's home that Gibbs and Jenny run, and our story begins with season 3, where we have just lost Kate...**

**Chapter One: It Shouldn't Have Been This Way  
**

The dark hair no longer clung to the sides of her face. Perhaps that was what upset him the most. She was forever brushing her hair out of her face, complaining that it needed cutting back again only a day after she'd had her chocolate tresses trimmed. It was the layers, she'd complain, the layers not only framed her face, they constricted it. The feather-light hair would brush against her cheeks, falling on her eyelashes at the slightest hint of a breeze. He was too used to seeing her brush her hair back over her shoulder as she leaned over her schoolbooks, or tuck it behind her ears during dinner, or groan in outrage before the mirror every morning before school trying to straighten it to the point where she felt it was acceptable to go into public with.

It hung back now of it own accord. As her head lay back all of her hair fell with it, landing beneath her in a mocha halo. No hands were needed to brush it out of her way, no hair band was needed to scrap it out of her face. Never again would this hair interrupt her reading, her drawing, her daily movements. He reached out a hand, touching the tresses with trembling fingers. Yes, they were still soft, still sweetly smelling of her floral shampoo too, no doubt.

If only the rest of her body had retained such similarity.

It didn't seem right that this unmoving form before him was Caitlyn Todd. If it wasn't for the trademark hair, he'd hardly believe it. Her skin was too pale, something that didn't suit her. She was always seen with the tiniest hint of a suntan, usually because of the endless hours she spent in the garden with her sketchpad, drawing the scenery, the flowers, the other children. For the same reason, it seemed ridiculous that her skin was this cold. She was perhaps one of the most warm-hearted people whom he'd ever encountered, especially considering her background.

And this still? He'd never seen her this way. Even when she was concentrating on the stokes of her sketching utensils, she was never completely still. Had he ever seen her unmoving before? No, he realised. When drawing, her wrist would change position so frequently, knowing the exact angle she would need for every shade, ever tone, every texture. When reading, her toes would curl and uncurl casually as they hung from the side of the couch. When sleeping, her nose would twitch and she would toss and turn, side to side.

It shouldn't have been this way.

"Oh, Caitlyn," he sighed, running his hands over that soft hair for the last time. "I am so sorry."

With a heavy heart, Dr. Mallard closed his eyes and turned from the teen's body, wishing himself able to remember her in a way that no longer had jagged scars across her wrists, her pale skin marred with blood even though the doctors at the hospital had cleaned it from her skin long before her arrived. He made his way out of the morgue, nodding to the doctor waiting just outside to signal that he was done, and with that, he made his way back to those who were waiting for him.

It shouldn't have been this way.

* * *

Leroy Jethro Gibbs stared at the photograph before him. He kept photographs, though rarely did he look at them. As he stared at the glossy print now, it seemed ridiculous that he would keep such a memorable moment away in a drawer, and a locked drawer, at that. This day was sunny, clear skies and smiles all round. This was a day that should be remembered and cherished, as today would not be. A nine-year-old Caitlyn, or Kate, as they all knew her, stared back up at him from the photograph. He remembered this as the first day she had smiled, two weeks after she had come to them at the Summerville Children's Home in downtown DC.

Like many others, Kate's past was too filled with pain for someone so young. Her mother and father had been tragically killed in a hold up in a bank, both heroes who tried to help others in the crisis who had ultimately paid the price for their courage. Kate had been five years at the time. The next year of her life was spent living at her grandparents house in northern Virginia alongside her four elder brothers and one elder sister. While two of her elder siblings went on to colleges at opposite ends of the country, her other three siblings remained with their grandparents with her, until her grandmother died. Their grandfather lived for only one year following that.

Now at seven years old, and beginning to understand that life was perhaps the cruellest thing she had been granted, she spent the next few years lost in the system of social services, thrown backwards and forwards between foster families while the courts could decide where to send them. There were no more relatives, no family friends who could take in four children, and with the elder two siblings studying medicine and science, they could not spare any time to take care of their siblings. So the Todd children were separated and placed into the Summerville Children's Home, after two years of struggle and movement. At first, the siblings kept to themselves, and none more so than young Katie, but eventually they began to open up more to the other children.

On the afternoon that this photograph had been taken had been the first time that Kate had come out of the shell that she had retreated into four years before. They had ensured that all the children went into the back yard and they had an afternoon of summer games, encouraging all of them to include the four newcomers. It had taken a few hours, but eventually even Kate was running around and laughing with the other children. This photograph showed the one child, in particular, that Kate had bonded with: ten-year-old Tony DiNozzo. Unlike many of the other children, who had arrived at Summerville too young to remember the circumstances, Tony understood what it was like to have nothing but bad memories to look back on.

But this happiness faded again. Kate's siblings gradually began to fade into new lives. First, Jacob had been adopted by a family in Virginia. Next, Veronica had been adopted by a childless couple in New York. Around the same time that Jacob's new family moved to California, Shaun was adopted and moved down to New Orleans. That just left Kate and Daniel at Summerville until a couple from DC had adopted Daniel. It wasn't as bad as the others, because Daniel was closest to Kate in age, and the family who adopted him ensured that the two siblings saw each other regularly, until a car accident had separated them forever. Daniel's adopted mother had survived the accident, but her husband and Daniel had died instantly.

Kate had become one of the ones who stayed. There were several of them now; the ones who couldn't, or never would, be adopted. Kate was one of them. Tony was another. These children stuck together, raised each other, treated Gibbs and Jenny, the owners of Summerville, as their own parents in the absence of their own. Their own family which they knew was good, because they had built it themselves.

Until now, it seemed.

Two knocks sounded on the office door, and he placed the photograph down on the desk, shoving it out of sight beneath some paperwork. "Come in," he said, covering up the gruffness of his voice as much as he could.

The door opened to reveal two teenage boys, the elder of whom was the sixteen-year-old form of the boy in the photograph. He was no longer the floppy-haired, mischievous youngster that he had grown into quickly after settling at Summerville. Now, he stood at almost six feet, towering over all the others, with the exception of Gibbs himself. His hair was always intently crafted into what he called 'perfection' and others called 'a mess'. True, the mischief was still there, but not right now. Now, his eyes were cold, they were broken and longing. There was no such similarity on the younger teen's face. Timothy McGee stood beside Tony, cowering beneath him at aged fourteen, only because he was too young to have reached his inevitable growth spurt yet. While Tony was attempting to step up past the grieving, Tim clearly wasn't. At least, that's what the stains on his face told him.

Tony stepped forward, clearing his throat. "We, uh….we found Kate's diary, boss."

"Thought it might help," Tim added, sounding much younger than he was.

The elder boy held out a plain black notebook. It had bounds of coloured hair scrunchies holding it closed as opposed to the more traditional lock. Gibbs took it, holding it in his hands as he stared at it. He touched the home-made bindings, but he didn't remove them. Instead he placed the diary atop the folder that hid the photograph. He would leave that to Dr. Mallard, their resident health practitioner and child psychologist. He moved around the desk to stand before the two boys, and only then, did he notice what should have alerted his attention first.

"Tony, you're soaking wet."

Tony looked up at him, almost confused until he looked back down at himself. He nodded slowly. "When I saw her like that, I had to get out of there…it was raining…"

"Go put some dry clothes on," Gibbs instructed softly. Tony nodded numbly, as Gibbs led them out of the office. He closed the door behind them. "I want you to both get some warm clothes on and meet me downstairs in the kitchen, okay? Stay away from Kate's room for a while."

Without waiting for an answer, he strode down the hall, leaving the two boys in his wake. Tim looked in confusion to the elder boy. "Why can't we go near her room?"

"He has to find the knife," Tony mumbled distractedly.

Tim frowned. "What knife?"

Tony looked down at the ground, leaning against the wall. "Didn't you see her?" he asked.

He shook his head. "After I heard, Jenny kept as many of us from seeing it as possible," he said.

"She cut her wrists," Tony said to him, keeping his voice down just in case any of the younger ones were lingering nearby and listening in.

"So, she didn't…she didn't suffer long?" he asked hesitantly.

"_Suffer_?!" Tony repeated, turning to face him with a strangely wild look in his eyes. "Of course she suffered, McGee!" he used his surname, something that he usually did as a teasing, but this wasn't a tease. "Unless you do something like that just right, it can take ages for things to end! Do you realise that every time we knocked on her door, asking if she wanted to watch a movie and she was apparently _sleeping _and couldn't answer, she was probably slowly bleeding to death on her bedroom floor!"

"Tony, please," Tim whispered, in an attempt to stall the rising yell that was directed at him.

Tony stopped shouting, breathing heavily as he forced himself to calm down. "I'm sorry, kid," Tony murmured afterwards, leaning against the wall and returning his gaze back to the ground.

"She was happy, right?" Tim asked after a moment. "I thought she liked it here."

"She was _content_," Gibbs whispered, as he walked back past them. "She wasn't happy."

And at the end of the day, they realised, how many of them were truly happy with what had happened to them before they arrived here?

* * *

Tony pulled on his clean shirt over his head, throwing a sweater on as well. He knew what he was like when it came to getting sick, and he didn't want to tempt fate. He didn't remember arriving here clearly, but he remembered waking up in the room that had become his permanent bedroom and having Jenny sitting at his bedside, helping him drink from a glass of water. He'd been six years old, and for a while he hadn't questioned anything. He'd missed the feeling of having somebody take care of him, so he had clung to the kind woman who had eased him through his coughing fits and warmed him when he shivered.

The door to Kate's bedroom, right beside his own, was closed, but he still shuddered when he walked past it. He knew that Gibbs was inside. He knew what Gibbs was looking for. He stopped for a moment when he saw three drops of blood littering the carpet beneath his feet. They were smeared now from the amount of times that people had walked over them…first Gibbs, then Dr. Mallard, then the paramedics…the rush of people who had done all they could to save her but then realised that ultimately, she was too far gone. He could remember his own terror as Abby had picked Kate's bedroom door lock, just as she always did whenever Kate might be upset and was refusing to talk to anybody, and then seen the horror inside Kate's bedroom. He could remember hearing the sound of Abby screaming in the bedroom doorway.

He hoped he never heard that scream again.

He carried on walking, not stopping or looking back until he reached Abby's bedroom door. It was ajar slightly, so he stuck his head around the door, knocking lightly on the door was he did so. "Abby?" he asked, as he stepped inside.

And then he heard that strangest sound.

Laughter?

"Abby?" he questioned again, before seeing her at her vanity table.

She had her head in her hands, looking down, but he could see in her reflection that she wasn't herself. Her face was paler than usual (which was pale, considering the fourteen year old had recently taken to the Gothic trademarks), and her eyes were red. She wore no make up, and her black hair was falling over her shoulders. She looked five years old again. She looked like she had done when one of the older girls first put her hair in pigtails for her. He didn't think he'd ever seen her without pigtails since then. She always kept photographs pinned around her mirror, smiles and laughter surrounding her every morning as she got ready for school, but one of them was taken down, leaving a deep purple shade on the wall in it's absence. He'd almost forgotten that these walls were purple with the amount of posters she'd covered them in. The photo, he realised from process of elimination, would have been one of her and Kate.

And yes, she was laughing.

She turned, looking at him with a big smile. "Hey, Tony."

"You okay?" he asked her, as he closed the bedroom door behind him.

"I will be," she announced brightly, "as soon as I tie up my pigtails."

"You're weird," he noted, as he stood behind her, watching as she effortlessly scooped her hair up and tied it in place. "Weirder than Gibbs."

She frowned. "How so?"

"He was being nice."

She cocked her head to one side. "Gibbs is always nice."

"To you, maybe," he nodded. "To me…growls at, smacks on the head."

"Which makes you feel loved and wanted," Abby smiled at him.

"Yeah," he admitted softly.

In the reflection of the glass they stared at each other for the longest time, and then it happened. Abby's sniffle started it, and then she launched herself into Tony's arms, almost too quickly for him to react. But he did. He recovered quickly because he knew what her hugs were like. He knew that she relied on hugs a lot more than some of the children here did. Most of them shied away from others altogether, content with this newfound family but not comfortable enough to embrace them with open arms.

Abby was different, however. She had come to Summerville at a year old, a bright young baby with shining eyes and a beautiful smile, at least, that's what the photographs told him. Her parents were both very young when they had their darling daughter Abigail, and while they had dreams for the future of their little girl, they had found it harder to cope with the little baby than they originally thought. He didn't know the exact cause, but some kind of accident had left both her parents deaf and shortly after that, Abby had arrived at Summerville. He knew that both her parents loved her, and that she saw them regularly, but when she was that young her parents had expressed their concerns to Gibbs, a close friend, and admitted the guilt that some nights she was left unattended to because they couldn't hear her crying.

Abby had been here for two years when Tony had arrived, and he remembered that he had bonded with the little toddler more easily than he had with any of the other children. Gibbs would not allow her to be adopted, as there was still the hope that one day her parents would take her home again, but he knew that Abby had lost hope of that years ago. Instead, she adopted them as her family. In her mind, Gibbs was her father, Jenny was her mother, and Tony was her big brother. And as the years went by and Tony, himself, was never adopted, he was more than happy to step into the role she'd created for him.

"Tony, I'm gonna miss her," she said to him tearfully, as she held him so tight that it hurt.

He didn't let go however, instead, he tried to reciprocate the force of her hold. "Me too."

**Okay, so that's the start of it. Other chapters will be longer (you know me) I just wanted to get the ball rolling. Tell me what you think! We will be seeing all the team dynamics in this...tiva, mcabby, jibbs, the what could have been with Tony and Kate, as the story progresses there'll be Jeanne, and Deep Six and Hollis...and Michael and Vance? It's a bit later, but I plan on really following the show with this story. Honestly tell me what you think, I love your guys reviews :D**

**x  
**


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two:**

Dr. Mallard closed the door behind him as he entered the Summerville home. He kept the action as quiet as possible, but it still seemed to cause a deafening echo throughout the large house. It seemed impossibly, however, that the twenty-one residents were sleeping, except perhaps the younger children. He turned to the hooks beside the door, noticing that every single hook bar one was filled with a jacket. Nobody had left the building besides himself. Everyone was here. Either that, or they had decided to go out without a jacket. The latter seemed unlikely, maybe because nobody would dare face the torrential rain outside without some cover, and he knew that Jethro and Jenny wouldn't have left the children tonight. It was why he had been the one to speak to the police and the doctors - they wanted to be with the children. They needed to be there for them because in all legal and emotional manners, they were their parents.

"Duck,"

He turned at the use of his nickname, the one which was rapidly becoming more used than his given name. He remembered when Anthony had first arrived, very sick from the condition he had arrived with them in, and he'd needed to spent plenty of time nursing the youngster back to full health. Anthony had been withdrawn, and it seemed unlikely for a while that they would ever see the boy smile. '_Did you know_', Ducky had told him one evening when his coughs were gradually beginning to reside '_that a mallard is a type of duck?_'. Tony had coughed through a tiny laugh. '_You're a duck_' he'd decided. Since then, the name had stuck, even with Jethro and Jenny. It was only one person, however, who called him 'Duck' as opposed to the more zoological term.

"Jethro," he greeted. The silence was resumed again, as he turned to the other man, standing at the far end of the hall, right near the entrance to the kitchen.

"Coffee," Gibbs told him.

"Please," Ducky nodded, even though it hadn't been a question.

He moved into the kitchen along with his friend, the two of them standing around as the kettle boiled for a second time. The mug that Gibbs held was still full, so it was no surprise that the water didn't take long to reach the boil.

"All of the paperwork has been sorted," Ducky spoke into the silence. "Caitlyn will remain at the hospital tonight. Tomorrow morning it will be taken to the local morgue to await the funerary arrangements." Gibbs nodded, but said nothing. "Have you contact her siblings?"

"It's late," Gibbs said simply. "I'll speak to the new parents in the morning."

Of course, it wouldn't be as simply as that. They had no contact details for her elder siblings, Jacob and Matthew. All the knew was that Jacob was at college, and Matthew had never been at the home since he was at college when their parents had died. There was no doubt that somebody with Gibbs' connections could find them, but they hadn't seen Kate for many years now. Matthew had children of his own, no doubt. Veronica and Shaun would be another story. They were easily contactable because of the records they held at Summerville, but whether they would want to attend the funeral of the sister they hadn't seen in seven years.

"She's with Daniel now," Gibbs said, drinking his coffee.

Ducky nodded solemnly. "Yes, I recall how close she was to her brother. It is comforting to think they are together now, wherever that may be. How are the other children?"

"Sleeping, mostly," Gibbs told him.

"Mostly?"

"Some are awake," he said vaguely, as if his attention were not all there.

"Abigail?" he questioned.

"She's still shook up," he confirmed.

"She's not alone?" Ducky checked.

Gibbs shook his head. "Jen's with her. Tony, too."

"Timothy?"

"Sleeping, last time I checked in," he nodded. He left out the tiny details, mainly because his mind was too exhausted to explain.

Jenny had spent hours coaxing the younger children back into their bedrooms once the paramedics had arrived, making noise and waking them up. While Gibbs had dealt with the technicalities, Jenny had made sure that all the children remained in their bedrooms as they removed Kate's body from her bedroom. Joshua and Jacob, the five-year-old twins whom had been with them for three years after they had been taken from their mother by social services, had decided once they were awake that they kept needing the bathroom. Jenny had carried them one by one down the hall, holding them to her and insisting that they hid their faces in their shoulder so that they didn't see the blood around Kate's bedroom.

With Jenny distracting the younger children long enough for them to get back to sleep (although how Gerald Jacskson had slept through the commotion being only three doors down from Kate's bedroom had been a wonder to them all) Gibbs had set about settling the older children. He'd found Tony and Abby embracing in her bedroom, Abby dangerously close to crying. He'd sent Tony to take a warm shower, noticing that even though he'd changed into dry clothes he was clearly still soaking wet from the rain underneath his sweater, and his hair was still dripping as well, even though he'd dragged a sweater over it. Once Tony had headed into the bathroom, he turned to Abby, who seemed lost without somebody to hold onto. He'd given her the hug she needed, holding her until her eyes started dropping, before moving her into her bed. She'd suddenly woken up sharply, insisting that she couldn't sleep, wouldn't sleep, and might never close her eyes again even to blink. Tony had returned and the two of them had moved down into the TV room.

When they had gone downstairs, Gibbs looked at Tony's door, closing it where he had left it open and ignoring the pile of unwashed clothes he'd let gather at the end of his bed again. They'd deal with laundry tomorrow. On one side of Tony's room was Kate's bedroom, but he turned to the bedroom on the other side of his: Tim's room. The door was ajar, just like Tony's had been, and he stuck his head through the gap. Tim had been sleeping, under the covers with his head on the pillow in a way that he knew Tony and Abby wouldn't be sleeping tonight. In fact, the only sign that something was amiss in this room was that the school books and adventure novels were piled all around the bed. Usually the only book left on top of the blankets was the one he was currently reading. Instead, there must have been every book he owned piled around him, just in case his distractions weren't enough and he needed a change of pace quickly. He removed the books from the bedcovers and put them on the ground, out of the way in case he moved in the night and tripped over them, and then he closed the door behind him.

Once back in the hall, he'd found fifteen-year-old James Palmer walking back to his bedroom. He'd stopped and stared at Kate's bedroom door, and then frowned at Gibbs. When his mouth opened to ask a question, however, Gibbs put his hand on his shoulders and guided him in the direction of his own door. "_Back to bed, Jimmy_," he'd said softly.

"This was not your fault, Jethro," Ducky told him quietly.

"Wasn't it?" he asked in retaliation.

"Caitlyn made this decision."

"She shouldn't have had the means to make it," Gibbs argued. "The knife she used…it wasn't one of ours."

Ducky frowned. "Illegally acquired?"

"Tony came to me a few days ago, said she'd been hanging around a 'rough kid' at school."

"Surely Caitlyn wouldn't…?"

"I don't know anymore, Duck," Gibbs said quietly. "If he gave her a knife, what else did he give her?"

Ducky shook his head firmly. "Caitlyn was very intelligent, Jethro. She would know not to get herself caught up with illegal substances." He put his hand on his shoulder. "Somebody would have noticed that change in her, of that, I am certain."

"Yeah, you're right, Duck."

-----------

Morning had come all too quickly, mainly because Tony had no sleep the night before. Abby had fallen asleep around three in the morning, an hour after she'd started to let the tears fall once again. He almost wished he had school as a distraction, but there was no such luck as they were greeted with a strangely glorious Saturday morning. Saturday - weren't Kate and Abby supposed to go shopping today? Never mind. Gibbs had somehow carried Abby upstairs and put her back into her bed for a few more hours sleep once the younger ones had started barrelling downstairs, completely ignorant to the events of the night before as they headed straight for the TV room for the Saturday morning cartoon run.

The elder ones were slightly more aware, and much more disheartened. Tim had come downstairs in his sweat pants and a t-shirt with a strange slogan on - apparently in his 'geek speak' it made sense, but Tony hadn't the time to bother understanding. He'd collapsed onto the couch, not complaining as Josh and Jake had piled onto him as a substitute chair. Usually Abby saved him from this fate, but she was asleep upstairs and wasn't there to put her hands on her hips and gently scold the twins for jumping on her Timmy, only to end up with the twins jumping on her, to which she had no complaints. Jimmy came down as if looking for something he was missing that he couldn't quite explain. Michelle, also fifteen, was silent as she bought her one year old sister, Amanda, downstairs with her. Jenny followed them, so it was more than likely that it was Jenny who had dressed and changed Amanda again.

Tony had no heart for the loud chatter of the younger children or the exaggerated noise of their television choices, and had stood up once they turned up the volume. Gibbs usually came in at this point and told them to turn the volume down - a Saturday morning tradition on his way to making the third cup of coffee - but he didn't. He was probably out. Surely he had plenty of arrangements that needed to be made?

He headed out to the stairs that lead away from the front door. Everyone was downstairs, but while upstairs would grant him complete privacy and peace, he didn't want to feel that detached from everyone. He took a seat three steps up and pulled his cell phone, waiting for an answer the other end.

"Chrissie….hi. Yeah, sorry I didn't call last night, something came up…no, I'm not just using that as an excuse…no, really….Look, Chrissie, I had a situation to deal with here last night…yeah, babysitting, whatever…anyway, I'm not going to be able to make our date this afternoon…no, Chris, there isn't another girl…I've just got my hands full here…You know I'd rather have my hands full with you…Well, I can't help it…sometimes, I just have to picture you naked…"

And that's when he noticed he wasn't alone.

Standing on the other side of the stair banister was a teenage girl, and it wasn't the one who was usually eavesdropping on his conversations. He'd expect to see Abby there teasing him about the girls he called, but this wasn't Abby. She just stared at him through the banister and he stared back at her.

"…Chrissie, I'm gonna have to call you back…" he spoke into the phone slowly, closing the phone without listening to the protests she screamed back at him. With that, he turned his full attention to the girl beside him. "Hi. I was just…"

"Having phone sex?" she questioned.

She wasn't local, that much was certain. Her voice was husky, tones of an accent overpowering the way the words rolled off her tongue as if she regularly asked unsuspecting teenage boys that question.

He tried to laugh it off, shoving his phone back into his pocket as he leaned on the stair above him to prop himself up. "Phone sex? No….uh….charades," he corrected.

"Charades?" she questioned. "Like, uh…." she moved her hands as if she were running an old-fashioned video camera.

He smirked. "You've played," he realised.

She just raised her eyebrows at him. "Never on the telephone."

"Oh, yeah," he said enthusiastically. "I was going to meet a girl tonight and she and I were coming up with quotes."

The stranger nodded at him, clearly not believing a word he was saying. "You play charades on a Saturday night?" she asked him accusingly.

He frowned, not liking her teasing. "To kill time before I go clubbing," he said rather grumpily. Not that he could go clubbing, legally. Not that he even played charades, to be honest. "Who are you?" he asked her, not losing his frown as he tilted his head to one side.

"Ziva David," she greeted. Ah, so the stranger had a name. A nice name. An exotic name. Like Xena, he thought. Warrior princess.

"You're not from around here," he assumed.

"No," she confirmed. "I am from Tel Aviv."

"Israel," he nodded.

"Very good," she praised falsely. "You have clearly seen a map before."

"Hilarious," he mocked. "What can I do for you?"

"I am here to see Leroy Jethro Gibbs and Jennifer Shepherd," she told him. "They run this facility, yes?"

"That would be correct," he nodded, sitting up properly. "Look, we got off to a bad start. I'm Tony DiNozzo, and I wasn't playing charades, I was trying to…convince my girlfriend into a certain type of date…"

"A naked date?" she accused him.

"No," he said quickly. She just raised an eyebrow at him. "Look, I'm not the only guy who does it."

"Girls do it, too," she said. "With good looking guys…" He scoffed at her and checked his phone, pressing the 'ignore' button when he saw Chrissie trying to call him back. "And even the occasional girl…"

He looked up sharply, seeing the laughter behind her eyes. "Now you're teasing me," he realised.

"And your girlfriend does not tease you?" she asked.

"Not about sex," he said bluntly. That was his own fault, really. You couldn't assume that a girl who's father was a priest was going to jump into the back of your friend's car with you. "Well, we're not entirely exclusive…"

"She is not attractive?" she asked.

"Not really…." That was a lie. Chrissie was smoking hot.

"Then why did you imagine her naked?"

She'd been here for five minutes, and already she had one-upped him. He glared at her, choosing not to answer her. The answer was obvious anyway - he thought about Chrissie naked because he was a sixteen-year-old brimming with hormones. He rarely got the chance to go out on dates thanks to the Summerville Curfew, something that Gibbs had laid down years ago and something he still wasn't entirely brave enough to break. He was ashamed to say that even though he was never without a girl hanging off his arm, his innocence was still intact despite what he bragged to everyone.

"Look, Ziva, right?" he asked. She nodded, so he continued. "Gibbs isn't here right now. So maybe you can tell me what you want and I can help?"

"Can you take me to Jenny Shepherd?" she asked him.

"Yeah," he said. "If you tell me why you've suddenly materialised here."

She smirked at him as the smell of warm toast filled the air from down the hall. Ziva's smile grew. "She is making breakfast, yes?"

"I guess so," he realised.

"I am sure I can find my way to the kitchen myself."

----------

Abby sat out in the garden, the sun beaming down on her white paper. She wasn't an amazing drawer, but she could hold a pencil pretty well, and she couldn't help but feel that if Kate were here she'd have been outside in the sun, drawing away. She'd plugged her I-Pod into the portable speakers she'd borrowed from Tim and was playing her music out of it. Tim also sat at the garden table with her, his chemistry book in front of him as he copied out the notes he needed for the test he had on Monday morning. While he was used to Abby's choice of music, this was a play list that he hadn't heard before.

Eventually, he threw his book down with a groan. "Abby, what is with this music?" he asked her.

She didn't look up from the paper she was doodling on as she answered him. "I'm playing it out of respect for Kate," she said simply. "It's what my biological family would have done."

Tim frowned. "But your biological family is in New Orleans," he pointed out.

"So?"

"Don't they play jazz at funerals?" he asked.

She looked up, her eyes narrowed in a scowl. "Coming from the cemetery after the body has been buried," she confirmed. "On the way to the cemetery, they play a dirge. Do you know what a dirge is, Timmy?"

He looked at the speakers for a moment. "Creepy music?" he asked.

"Can you go back inside and let me have some peace and quiet?" she asked him harshly.

He looked at her awkwardly. "I can't."

"Why?" she shot back.

He mumbled his response. "…Gibbs told me to watch over you."

"Oh!" she realised, turning back to her drawing with a small smile on her face. "That is so sweet, Timmy!".


End file.
